Natural History of Palms

The Natural History of Palm Trees via Bibliodyssey.
Link: http://bibliodyssey.blogspot.com/2009/07/historia-naturalis-palmarum.html
Access: Free

Joan Miro

Website companion to this exhibit about Spanish artist Joan Miró that "opens with a series of paintings on unprimed canvas made in Paris in early 1927. ... It concludes with 1937's singular, hallucinatory painting 'Still Life with Old Shoe', the result of Miró's abrupt return to working from life." View exhibition images by series (with essays at the start), chronologically, and by relative size. Includes an exhibition checklist. From the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA).
Link: http://media.moma.org/subsites/2008/miro/
Access: Free

15th-18th Century Tapisteries

Companion website to this 2008-2009 exhibit that featured life-sized tapestries from the 15th through the 18th century, depicting "allegories, biblical and Christian themes, events from ancient history, and mythological scenes, as well as representations of everyday life and verdures." Features illustrated essays on the use and function of tapestries, weaving structures, color in tapestries, and more. Includes a map and selected works from the exhibit. From the Art Institute of Chicago.
Link: http://www.artic.edu/aic/collections/exhibitions/divineart/index
Access: Free

Illustrations of the Western Frontier

Collection of hundreds of items from a "scrapbook kept by an American illustrator, James E. Taylor (1839-1901). A professional artist, Taylor's newspaper illustrations served to popularize stereotypes of the Western frontier during the post-Civil War years." Browse individual images of drawings, photos, news clippings, and letters, or view album pages on gold mining, Mexican life, and other topics. From the National Anthropological Archives, National Museum of Natural History, Smithsonian Institution. Smithsonian Institution.
Link: http://www.nmnh.si.edu/naa/taylor/
Access: Free

British Gangsters

BFI ScreenOnline this month takes a look at British gangsters, from Richard Attenborough’s memorable Pinkie in 1947’s Brighton Rock to equally vivid portrayals from the likes of Stanley Baker, Michael Caine, James Fox, Bob Hoskins, Richard Burton and Ben Kingsley. Meanwhile, focus is also on the centenaries of André Morell, the definitive Professor Quatermass, and Tommy Trinder, music hall star, comic actor and TV entertainer.
Link: http://www.screenonline.org.uk/
Access: Free

Japanese Woodblock Prints

The Prints and Photographs Division of the Library of Congress houses more than 2,500 Japanese woodblock prints and drawings, dating from the seventeenth to the twentieth centuries, by such artists as Hiroshige, Kuniyoshi, Sadahide, and Yoshiiku. The collection can now be searched online.
Link: http://tinyurl.com/lcaswe
Access: Free

Glasgow in the 1970s and 1980s

SCRAN has recently added a selection of images from the personal photographic collection of Alan Knight. All are in black and white and record the life, industry and people of mostly working-class Glasgow in the 1970s and 1980s.
Link: http://www.scran.ac.uk/database/results.php?id_proj=1015
Access: Athens account required

British Periodicals Online

GSA Library now has access to a new and rich resource which comprises the full text of more than 500 British periodicals from the 1680s to the 1930s. A wide range of different types of periodical is represented, including many classic fine art titles such as 'Art Journal', 'Magazine of Art', and the 'Yellow Book'. Links to the most useful titles in the arts have been created from the GSA library catalogue.

Link: http://britishperiodicals.chadwyck.co.uk/home.do

Access: Free, but only available on GSA campus

Please Plant This Book

Richard Brautigan published Please Plant This Book in 1968 - a collection of 8 poems printed on seed packets and held in a folder. The artist's book was produced in a limited edition of 6000 for free distribution. Now Andrew Stafford has given it a second life, by making a digital version.
Link: http://www.pleaseplantthisbook.com/
Access: Free

ABC de Babar

The Bibliotheque National de France has just launched this online exhibition on the book ABC de Babar by Jean de Brunhoff.
Link: http://expositions.bnf.fr/livres-enfants/jeux/babar/index.htm
Access: Free

Caboodle

Culture24 is launching a new, fun and safe collections website for children called Caboodle. The site is live currently as a BETA (testing phase) so take a look.
Link: http://www.caboodle.org.uk
Access: Free

Pembroke Album

The Pembroke Album at the Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division is a collection of 91 images, primarily chiaroscuro woodcuts by Italian printmakers active in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.
Link: http://www.loc.gov/rr/print/coll/611_pembroke.html
Access: Free

Ad * Access

The Ad*Access Project presents images and database information for over 7,000 advertisements printed in U.S. and Canadian newspapers and magazines between 1911 and 1955. Ad*Access concentrates on five main subject areas: Radio, Television, Transportation, Beauty and Hygiene, and World War II, providing a coherent view of a number of major campaigns and companies through images preserved in one particular advertising collection available at Duke University.
Link: http://library.duke.edu/digitalcollections/adaccess/
Access: Free

Alexander Calder's Paris Year

Companion to a 2008-2009 exhibit about artist Alexander Calder's time in Paris starting when he arrived in 1926 and "aspired to be a painter; ... [and ending] when he left in 1933, [after] he had evolved into the artist we know today: an international figure and defining force in twentieth-century sculpture." Features images and video, the exhibition brochure, chronology, and other information about the exhibit. From the Whitney Museum of American Art.
Link: http://www.whitney.org/www/calder/index.jsp
Access: Free

Early Advertising and the West

This digital collection "consists of over 450 print advertisements published in local magazines, city directories, and theater pamphlets from 1867 to 1918. These advertisements were selected and digitized in order to help researchers and students examine social, cultural and economic trends during this period." Includes an essay, brief bibliography, and sample searches (such as fashion and Klondike Gold Rush). From University of Washington Libraries Digital Collections.
Link: http://content.lib.washington.edu/advertweb/
Access: Free

Penguin Science Fiction Covers

The Art of Penguin Science Fiction' is a website showcasing the history Penguin Books' science fiction cover art. The site is navigated initially visually, from a homepage consisting of thumbnails of the book covers. Once users have navigated away from the homepage, the site takes on more of the structure of a book, with covers and descriptions available via an index or a contents list. The site focuses mainly on the period 1935 - 1977, dividing this into design phases, with a general introduction to all, and a specific introduction to each phase. Covers are shown as small images, accompanied by a brief explanation contextualising the design or artwork within the main history. Covers can be viewed by title as well as within historical context, making it easy to compare designs across the decades.
Link: http://www.penguinsciencefiction.org/
Access: Free

Greene & Greene

View the designs of Art Nouveau designers Greene & Greene in a variety of media, from furniture, stained glass, and metalwork, to rare drawings and photographs. From the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.
Link: http://www.mfa.org/exhibitions/sub.asp?key=15&subkey=7951
Access: Free

Vision of Britain Through Time

A Vision of Britain Through Time provides access to over two centuries’ worth of facts, figures, surveys, maps, election results and travel writing showing how 15,000 UK places have changed. The changing story of Britain’s towns and villages can be explored in new depth online, which unites more than 200 years worth of official documents, maps and travel stories.
Link: http://www.visionofbritain.org.uk/
Access: Free

Anthropology Collections

This site provides online access to the anthropological collections of the California Academy of Sciences. Highlights of the collection include the Reitz collections of Coptic textiles and Food Technology; the Rollo Beck collection of Oceanic artifacts and photographs; the Allen collection of lamps; and extensive collections of Mayan, Native American, Native Alaskan, Hawai'ian and Kenyan objects. The collections cover an extensive range of materials and techniques, from linen and wool textiles to ceramics, wooden carvings, and metalwork, as well as photographic and written accounts which record the history and usage of the objects.
Link: http://research.calacademy.org/research/anthropology/anthcoll.html
Access: Free

Gemstone Carving

The website for the Getty Museum has provided this online resource on the exhibition held at the Getty Villa from 19 March to 7 September 2009 on `Carvers and Collectors: The Lasting Allure of Ancient Gems'. This exhibition features intaglios and cameos carved by ancient Greek master carvers. Information is provided on the techniques used to carve these objects.
Link: http://www.getty.edu/art/exhibitions/gems/
Access: Free

Barbara Reise Archive

As an introduction to their rich archive, the Tate has provided this online resource featuring the art critic Barbara Reise, and her involvement in the art world of the 1960s and 1970s. Designed as a journey through the archives of Reise, this website features a timeline of events during her lifetime with hyperlinks to relevant items in the archive. Biographical material is also provided including her work as an art history lecturer and critic. The Reise Archive includes material on the `decade of revolution', artist critics and US/UK relationships. The section headed `Art Movements' considers the public and art world reactions to Minimalism and Conceptual art which dominated the 1960s and 1970s. Artists featured in this archive include Dan Flavin, Baranett Newman and Robert Morris.
Link: http://www.tate.org.uk/archivejourneys/reisehtml/
Access: Free

David Hockney's East Yorkshire Landscapes

The LA Louver Gallery in California has provided this online resource to complement their exhibition `The East Yorkshire Landscape', held from 9 February to 24 March 2007 featuring the work of David Hockney. Hockney painted these large landscapes en plein, and he provides a short statement as to why he undertook to work in this way. The website is illustrated with a number of the works in this exhibition and an installation video has been made available describing the Hockney exhibition.
Link: http://www.lalouver.com/html/hockney_07.html
Access: Free

Antony Gormley's Blind Light

This website was published by the South Bank Centre, to complement the Antony Gormley ‘Blind Light’ exhibition, held at the Hayward from 17 May to 19 August 2007. The works featured are ‘allotment’, ‘blind light’, ‘capacitor’, ‘event horizon’ and ‘space station’ in which Gormley addresses issues of architecture and space. A photo essay featuring images of twelve different spaces and different lights from around the world is included.
Link: http://www.southbankcentre.co.uk/gormley/light.html
Access: Free

Artists' Books II

Book/Shelf is an online version of, and companion to, the exhibition, held at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York, from 26 March to 7 July 2008. The exhibition takes work from MoMA's collection and library, which are "rich in works by artists who tackle the idea of books by stretching the conventions of the medium", and shows exhibits of modern art in the shape of books. The website, which requires Flash plug-in 8.0 or higher, presents highlights of the work including photography, film printing, assemblage, drawing, and sound recording. The works can be arranged by thumbnail view or by artists' names. There are also website credits and a 'checklist'; a PDF document with a list, images where available, and details of each work in the exhibition.
Link: http://www.moma.org/interactives/exhibitions/2008/bookshelf/
Access: Free

Artists' Books

This is the online companion to the exhibition 'Typebound', curated by Craig Saper and Theo Lotzheld, which was held at the University of Central Florida Art Gallery from 27 January to 6 March 2009. Typebound's two parts; 'The Book's Bound' and 'Socio-Poetics of Typewriting' is an exhibiton of artists' book works where "two of the book's most fundamental elements - its bindings and its type - are separated and examined for creative possibilities as they are freed of their basic, traditional functions." The works shown were from the Florida Collections and The Sackner Archive of Concrete and Visual Poetry respectively. The website has an introduction to the concept behind the exhibition and the catalogue can be downloaded in full, including a few essays and a number of illustrations. Essays can be downloaded (also as PDF files) independently of the catalogue and there is also a link to images of the exhibition on Flickr.
Link: http://www.readies.org/typebound/
Access: Free

Abner Graboff

The Retro Kid Flickr pool has a collection of scans from designer Abner Graboff.
Artist, illustrator & designer with a career that spanned several decades, from the 1940’s to the 80’s, Abner was best known for creating some of the most ingenious and vibrant children’s books during the mid-century era.
Link: http://www.flickr.com/search/groups/?q=graboff&w=83979980%40N00&m=pool
Access: Free

Edvard Munch Prints

To accompany their new major exhibition on prints by Edvard Munch, Hunterian Art Gallery have just launched a mini-site with some examples of the exhibited works:
Link: http://www.hunterian.gla.ac.uk/munch/munchGallery.php
Access: Free

Edo Natural History

Fauna and Flora in Illustrations : Natural History of the Edo Era is an online exhibition from the National Diet Library of Japan, accessible only in Japanese. The site is divided into four broad sections: an introduction to the materials in the exhibition; the development of natural history publications; the evolution of uniquely Japanese horticulture; and rare birds, strange animals and curious fish. Each section has enlargeable thumbnails of illustrations embedded in explanatory text. The introductory section describes some of the features of the illustrations and the books and other texts in which they appear, and each of the other sections is further broken down into various aspects of the topic it covers.
Link: http://www.ndl.go.jp/nature/
Access: Free